draft 2020 board retreat minutes

Board Retreat Meeting Minutes January 28, 2020

Adobe Attending: Pete Hanning, Brandi Gaines, Amina Leighton, Phil Megenhardt, Suzie Burke, Sean Erhardt, Paul Robinson, Ken Saunderson Not Attending: Carrie Bauer, Sarah Kennedy, Nate Mouttet, Timothy Tackett, Michael Wanaka Staff: Whitney Moore, Caroline Sherman The meeting was called to order at 12:19 PM by Pete. Welcome – Pete

A. Pete read the Mission Statement: The Fremont Chamber of Commerce strengthens the business climate and improves the quality of life in the Fremont community.

B. Introductions around the table. Housekeeping (see agenda) -- Pete

A. Ground rules & agreements. B. Good ideas go into the Parking Lot. C. Off-Line Conversations. D. Who is Leaving Early?

a. Pete E. Review of Retreat Agenda F. Approval of November minutes. Suzie moved, Ken seconded. All in Favor. Approved! G. Break will be at 2-2:15.

President’s Message--Pete Been thinking a lot about Fremont and the Chamber and the Red Door. Message: Big and Small. Emily and I made the hardest and biggest decision we’ve ever made in our lives. When you have to make those decisions, it’s a lot of small things that lead into that. Small not insignificant, but adds up to the whole. 31 years is a long time. Sense that Red Door would never grow again; either stay where it is or get smaller. A hard thing to come to grips with. The next 5 years out, the business climate has changed drastically. The wonderful tech companies that make everything vibrant, there is looking inward. But the internal café programs that are becoming more ubiquitous, that effects our business greatly. Minimum wage going up 25% next two years. Property taxes going up. All these small things led us to our decision. Also looked at big and small of who Fremont is. We are a smaller neighborhood. We are east and west. S Lake Union, Ballard, UDistrict are all bigger. Nothing wrong with our smallness. We need to be OK with the size we are and the impact

FCC Board Retreat Minutes 1/28/20

we have. Be OK with where we are. Just because we didn’t solve something, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have tried. Successes and failures. Most personal to me is that we haven’t found a pathway to help Jason Smith. That man is in crisis every day. Found him in P2 in crisis. Told him he couldn’t be down there. He said “I know. Have you got anything to eat?” We need to invest. I’m closing the Red Door, I’m leaving the Chamber but I’m not going away. Going to help him with food and clean clothes. Reach out to him in a small way because they are the small things and they lead to bigger. Also disappointed that we haven’t healed the family relationship with FAC. We don’t want them to go away. We really should take a look at that. It would be healthy to have a mediator who is there for both sides, who is invested in finding ways forward. The other is the Hysterical Markers. We have the asset, it doesn’t have to be perfect, just better than we’re doing. Let’s not overthink it. Successes: Fremont has a much more vibrant community than many other neighborhoods. It’s you folks right here. We should be really proud that we are financially stable. That is something to be really proud of. We know lots of non-profits who aren’t able to maintain that. We are legal and above board, etc. Suzie gave us the crosswalk and light. Community members who paid for some of it through the Chamber. The big and small. The big role that Fremont Dock plays in our community as the largest landowner in the community. And to take some of the unfair hits. It’s something to acknowledge here at this board level. So thankful that Amina is getting involved. Suzie so instrumental in make the chamber successful. Really proud to spend all this time on the board. Made good friends. Programming that Ken has elevated! It is the small things. I’ve been a lover of poetry all my adult life. Pete met Sherman Alexie right here were the old Sound Mind and Body used to be. Where the old Western Drug used to be. We played basketball for years. He has this poem: we are a small tribe, we build small fires. It’s OK that we build small fires. Really thankful for all my time here! 11 years on the board. IN Fremont since the early 70’s. Applause. Ken: Thanks for your leadership and thoughtfulness and heart. It’s inspiring to me. You have made a difference. Hospitality. Pete: Been doing hospitality for 35 years! Ready for another one. Next chapter: public policy project I want to work on. Will be reaching out. Yard work. Wonderland trail. Our democratic candidate’s campaign and try to change political climate. Run for City Council in 2021. YAY!!! I might lose! But if I don’t…. Will be needing lots of your input and support on many of these things. Fremont is where it all starts, but I’m not going anywhere. Brandi: Learned so much from you, and more all the time. Pete: Will stick around for a while and then take off.


Swear jar: Has them at home, in his car, will have one on the campaign trail. Will donate the funds to media places. The Value of Fremont – Brandi

A. Why Fremont? a. Suzie: Community Action and conversation gets things done in Fremont. If we don’t

make it happen, nothing happens. You’ve got to enunciate it and support it and give the one guy that’s doing something a star.

b. Ken: a unique and diverse community. Lots of different groups in one place, Neighborhood Council, Arts Council, etc. All this that other neighborhoods don’t have. That creativity and energy. It’s not a hard sell. They want to do business here.

c. Phil: Vitality, rowing club, Burke Gilman Trail. Walking, driving, running through Fremont. Business community is unique. You are living and working here…Access. Times of the day: morning business, afternoon businesses, evening business. Not like lights out. We are 24 hours, we have a huge Sunday. We started one of the largest and most successful events. The legacy of the Fremont Fair and Solstice Parade is GLOBAL. So much bigger than the U-District Fair.

d. Suzie: People actually like to say they are from Fremont, their girlfriend lives in Fremont… There is still a Fremonter.

e. Sean: Our small plays into our strength. Fremont is personalized, personal ownership. Center of the Universe title is so appropriate. We are in the center surrounded by other big neighborhoods. We are the hub. Why did all the tech come here? It’s because of the access and culture, etc.

f. Phil: Center of the Universe—it has such a legacy. g. Suzie: Set your clock back. Leave your watch behind. A total of 4. Kirby has them.

Summary: h. Always Open i. Center of the Universe, Open 8 Days a week j. On the 8th Day, God created Fremont

B. Why the Fremont Chamber? a. Suzie: The Chamber can say it when the small business can’t. You can be more free

with pointing out what’s not working. b. Pete: We’re the lowercase “c” chamber. We’re about the smaller business. c. Phil: Security guard. We are watching our neighborhood. We are making sure it’s

safe. Our programs reflect this. We are stewards. Bridge closure—we wouldn’t let that happen!

d. Suzie: And they did a lot of the work on the weekend and worked through Xmas. Thought they had to close, but we said push on through. The business community has to have a voice, or it get’s disregarded. Nordic Heritage project said that project has been a disaster. No Ballard Chamber to help out. Turner is a prime example. Just can’t find anything but good things to say about them, but also because we asked them to do more to help the small businesses.

e. Pete: The fact that the VP of Turner went to Franklin High School had something to do with it.


f. Suzie: Asko worked hard to make things work. g. Ken: Another thing has been “Make Fremont Awesome”. We should take credit for

the programs we support. Celebrate the Awesomeness. h. Phil: Distinguishing the art. That’s what makes Fremont funky. Identifying the art is

really important. i. Ken: Third leg along with creativity and awesomeness: connections. Can be awfully

lonely as a small business. We work hard to build community. Networking, huge value!

j. Pete: small businesses talking about how hard its been around public safety. Hearing from fellow restaurateurs were all supportive when he announced the closure. They felt the messaging was well done and was messaging for them. The Chamber does a good job with the messaging. The fact that Ballard and U-District don’t have chambers is not good for us.

Summary: a. Voice of small business b. Collaboration, connection, networking c. Chamber (small c) d. Protection of neighborhood/stewards. What’s best for community. e. Make Fremont Awesome (events) f. Providers of Fremont Pride.

C. Do we need to change our Mission Statement?

a. Fremont makes good funky and fun things happen. Fremont Gets Shit Done. b. Own the “center of the universe”. c. Chamber makes the Center of the Universe happen d. Phil: Value proposition: include growth, include 24/7 (or 8). Quality of life. That

creator element is something that could be included. e. Fremont Gets It Done f. Amina: Fremont Chamber keeps the CoU open, creating and expanding. g. Quality of life, energy, vitality, access h. Whitney read a list of taglines… i. Noodle on this. Whitney to keep track of these new ideas. j. Ken: doesn’t have to be used in our marketing. It’s a statement of who we are. We

can use the words we’ve created to write paragraphs. k. Suzie: don’t be afraid to say we are about business.

Summary: Ponder this for a week. Share ideas with Whitney for the next week. Re-convene in a week. Finalize at next board meeting.

D. State of Fremont – What are the Challenges and opportunities?

a. Phil/Paul Crime. Aslan Brewing broken into, safe stolen. b. Suzie: Car theft up 80% in City of Seattle. Biggest piece is breaking into (vs stealing.)

We are not arresting crime. Outdoor drug market & fencing market. Criminals can turn whatever they grab into drugs. We can’t start out by saying “We know these folks are hungry.” They are not hungry; the thieves are working on a big scale. Cutting out fencing and selling it to salvage.


c. Pete: Civility, knowing rights and wrongs. We’re struggling all across the board. d. Suzie: The truth is, you are not doing the petty criminal any good with this

approach. Need to come down hard. Show consequences. Then help them out. e. Phil: How do we turn that into our value? How do we make sure Aslan is very clear

on crime prevention? f. Suzie: Wants Eric Sano to come with Mary Amberg in Crime Prevention and go

around and talk to business owners. Identify things that need to be hardened up. Then each can help themselves and the community can pitch in and fill in the gaps. As a chamber we have to say we want to help Police & Crime Prevention assets to be successful in our community for the benefit for our community. We have to be extremely forceful on that. Too much weasel-words on that.

g. Phil: need to get to know Dan Strauss. Needs to be invited every time. His intern called us to ask for a general list of business. Put him on invite for every program meeting.

h. Ken: Picnic on the Dock this year. We need a big draw, as no one running for office this year. Invite all City Council members along the Ship Canal. Dan Strauss, Andrea Lewis, Alex Pederson. Impacts entire ship canal.

i. Phil: new SDOT guy wants to close bridges. j. Ken: Best thing was the walk about. Should organize that again. k. Suzie: Garbage cans. We’re still on the list. Bifurcating costs to SPU garbage that

gets paid for, and then City Waste covers events, encampments, and our garbage cans that we want. Suzie has the guy’s name. He’s also thinking of getting us a couple of garbage passes for our dump for a clean up or whatever, Earth Day. Outreach to general garbage, graffiti etc that doesn’t get covered by your garbage collection bill.

l. Ken: Bring everyone together on a project like that. 50th Anniversary of Earth Day. Work with Friends of Troll’s Knoll, Rowing club, Puget Soundkeeper Alliance, FAC, Rotary Club, etc.

m. Pete: board and volunteers are hard to come by. Part of our society these days. We can continue to invest and build community. Back to Jason Smith. He shifted his attitude towards him by introducing himself by his first name to help diffuse things. Pushing back at the anonymity and lack of civility. On social media everyone comes from different camps. We need to try to build those places where we can come together and have hard discussions. When I helped coach kids there was more impact in learning how to lose and move forward. Important to have a goal to grow, but it’s OK that we haven’t. It’s a strength.

n. Phil: Growth and work to maintain 230 members. To not shrink is growth. We have to shift our thinking about our value in our programs, but marketing, WG, etc. All of these things are expenses, but also investments. One opportunity we do have: the events. City of Seattle Special Events & Mayors Office. Get cost recovery from them. And our new mayor is trying to shift back to the value of culture.

o. Suzie: Sara Scherer now leading at office of economic Development. p. Phil: At special events meeting. I’m an event producer and also a Chamber Events

Coordinator. How do we sustain these things? So big! FAC doesn’t know how much this Chamber does for them. We as a Chamber when we speak of these events, we


need to include the Parade, on behalf of Fremont and FAC. The city sees the parade and fair as one thing.

q. Ken: Fremont Market celebrating 30th Anniversary. Work with Ryan on that. Thank Jon for getting that started? Look at business sectors and ask how we can help. Retail and restaurants are hurting? What can we do to help?

r. Phil: Block Party—everyone works eats lives in the buildings and go home. 17 cafes and restaurants inside are hurting the rest of the businesses. Adobe’s café is a paid café. Google has a bunch of services that are free.

s. Suzie: Tableau doesn’t have a café. Consistently has a thing to send folks out and have lunch on us. Adobe & Tableau are outward looking and Google is inward looking. Block party idea is fabulous!

t. Ken: Chamber supports, but Google manages. Get cider gal to run with Cider Passport. How can we support the idea?

u. Brandi: Let’s do this for retail, too! v. Suzie: Kirby did a bingo thing for the first 15 businesses that were interested. w. Caroline: Justin Young & NIFT x. Phil: First Friday Art Walk. It’s always someone. We can always partner into that.

Goal: Chamber to understand how we can help support this, understand this, etc. In Chelan: a wine walk. Take a case of wine to 10 stores. It’s working.

y. Whitney: Video to give a sampling of the Art Walk. z. Suzie: Raffle gift card that was given away at Festivus and incorporate that into First

Friday Art walk. Review and Discussion of 2019 Action Agenda -- Ken

We are not a paid board, but we get and got a lot of stuff done. As we review the list of everything we did last year, it’s pretty impressive! Hoping at the end of the day to come up with a 2020 action plan. Take a quick check-in on it at each board meeting. Phil: We need to add Events under Review of 2019.

Calendar of Awesomeness Suzie: renewed our no new parking. Loading zones. We are diligent about this. Business needs to ask for it and we back them up. Get the word out that we are able to help businesses retain and get a loading zone. It doesn’t help the Uber etc drivers, but it does help the businesses. Downtown it’s down to 8% are loading zones. Phil: Are they paid parking up in Upper Fremont? Suzie: Evanston, 35th, the front of Fremont Ave, but concentrated right there. Doesn’t make it good. Evanston not used before 11, and empty after 3 and then used in the evening. Not much parking enforcement. Because of she’s on the committee, she will get a printout on how much $$ the City earns on Fremont’s paid parking. Probably really low. Ken: Get this out on SM and the website. Suzie: Hand out the CoA at meetings—put on chairs. It’s amazing stuff. Blow our horn. Caroline’s Report (see handouts):

• WG: More listings than the previous 2 years


o Reviewed Walking Guide report (Phil interjected to say we should start the WG

sales season on time or one-month earlier—hitting September & October the hardest)

• Internship--Hopeful that we can do the internship this Fall to coincide with the WG sales season

• Membership--Reviewed the report o Phil: How can we maintain U-Park at the Sustaining membership level? o Suzie: there will always be a 10% fall off due to businesses closing o Phil: How can we make membership more sellable, the telethon fell-off (the board

needs to pick that up again). 95% of the weight of the membership is on Caroline & Whitney

Whitney’s Report (see handouts): Been here officially for a year! Breakdown of her time. 3-month Google My Business Analytics. Outperforming other businesses in the same category. Just posting things in Google My Business, since May Google Tech Tips, Whitney has been posting there and it’s working. Membership takes the most of her time to build relationship, etc. Digital presence increased, big media library. Better open rates on Blast! The Blast is much more readable. KUDOS to Whitney! Beating the industry consistently. Social media followers vastly increased. FAC: Commercial use of the Troll. Artist gave commercial control to FAC in exchange for maintenance. Suzie: Who is the Arts Council this year? Phil: We have a written agreement with FAC about using the Troll. Whitney: Working on relationship with FAC. Ken: Make a plan Get out on the streets Improve communications Programs -- Ken Had a great selection of speakers and topics. Tried to highlight different neighborhoods. Attendance was exceeded. Tried some smaller events that may not have worked out so well, but there may still be a place for them. March Happy Hour wasn’t well attended. Anti-Shoplifting workshop. Great valuable service, great event, but low attendance. Small charge which some folks didn’t like. If it’s free, harder to ensure attendance. Got about 80% of programs sponsored, or the underwriting of the breakfast. There are some holes. Would like to get input on filling them. Getting impact where starting to see the Chamber as a vehicle for program. Theo’s would like to offer a free tour to do that. Team bldg event for big tech companies. Did not hit financial goals: short by $1,800. Probably not a money-making enterprise. Would have to expand to do big events and invite folks out of the area. We could get good sponsorship, but does this fit into our direction? Maybe it’s a service, not a money maker.


Suzie: Perhaps it’s enough to cover Ken’s fees to do it. Not a profit center. Phil: Facts: the way I look at programs. Everything we’ve talked about is worth it. Year and a half has changed our events dramatically, much more professionally run, etc. Income, took out expenses, net hosting meetings is $6,876. Total cost of meetings is $10,214. Breaks down to $850/meeting for the Chamber to underwrite it. Switch our thinking and create a story by adding $850 to the budget and say it’s the Chamber’s contribution. Goes under marketing and/or member benefits. Then sponsorships at $850 would be gold standard. Recognize that it is a service that we provide. Ken: See upcoming schedule for upcoming meetings. Challenges: getting all board members to show up to at least 6 meetings. Getting help from board to get more sponsorship. Challenge to get a variety of small business interests. Getting folks to sign up sooner. Add a door fee? Whitney: Could beef up Blast coverage of sponsors. Phil: Look at $3k Sustainable sponsorship, and then Day Of sponsor. Look at top tiers and see what we’re valuing. Ken: Every time the Blast goes out it recognizes the upper-tier members. Budget – Phil Positives: working with Stephen. Caroline, Phil & Stephen figuring out gaps in processing. Accuracy is good and can get better. Revenue Engines: See Budget vs Actuals sheet. Gross profit down 10%. WG doing really well! Membership down by 13%. Meetings down 37%. We had bigger events planned in the budget that didn’t happen. For 2020, move the number of attendees down to 30 people per event and see how that works for the programs/meetings budget. New thinking to look at it as a marketing expense. Major Fundraising: 107% on events. So we are at 90% of Gross Profit for the year.

• WG expense 3% over. Website expenses will go up. Culture Foundry wants to put us in a maintenance program that is not cheap. Phil recommends updating/refining Chamber Dashboard and moving on from there.

Consultants have done a lot. Came in at 105% and they have done a LOT. Met quarterly and talked about their time. Asked them to tangibly show where their time is spent. 50% is in revenue generating time. That is really good! Everything else is in the zone. We are at 102% on general expenses. Expenditures overall are down. We have an overall loss of $6,347. Last year we were up $3k. If you look at our revenue engines, we were down $12k. Our expenses were down, but not as much. Looking at 2020, our goal is to get to net zero, have sustainable wages for contractors. Pay is important. Kudos is also nice. How we can boost our membership—the board really needs to help with this. Looking at these numbers, any questions? Ken: Thank you! Really tells a story! Whitney has learned a lot from Phil. She’s only been working for herself for a year and it’s helped a lot!


EVENTS – Phil • Bold Hat has Eli from Tough Mutter. Sales for booth fees are on a new path. How we work

with Arts Council is up in the air. We do work together the last week on Safety. • At the Fremont Fair Phil’s been working with John Pletsch at Electric Pen. Getting him to

come up with a Rocket Design. Folks walk right by the Rocket! Folks don’t know about the Cold War. The war coloring can go away and dress it up in bold colors and make it celebratory. Come up with ideas and a booth at the Fair and folks can vote and donate. Set up a bunch of stuff doing that. Fremont Fair Rocket Painting intention. Thermostat, paint when we meet our goal, lots of social media.

• Other thing FFair will do this year will be an ice cream tasting event. PCC creating their own ice cream brand—the Oktoberfest of ice cream. Creating a new element for Fremont Fair to maintain vibrancy and fun. Father’s Day weekend again. Will increase food sales. GelatOberfest?

• Increase in fees from City of Seattle: Keeping them the same as last year. Oktoberfest police fees up to $25k. And it’s the easiest gig for the police. Challenge with Oktoberfest is that. One of the things we did a couple of years ago. Would it make sense to move Oktoberfest to Gas Works Park? The Parks Dep’t wouldn’t do that years ago, as it involves closing things down. But now they do for private concerns, so the precedent has been set. Neighborhood is changing, so putting it out there, but anywhere near making that change, but as a concept we put it out to the City and they like it. It rings registers in Fremont Businesses. It’s the number one fundraiser for the event. If we can be more profitable in the park, that’s good, but the park takes 10% of any sales, whether on site or not. So working with the City to see how they can help us. They can negotiate pricing.

• Liquor Cannabis Board laws are changing for the better. Past the 2-year probation from the all ages infraction. Working with Senator from Chelan, a special event licensee is different from a 365-event thing. It’s great legislation and says we’d never lose the ability to put the event on, though we’d be punished for infractions.

What should the Chamber/Staff Priorities and Core Competencies: Creating our Action Agenda

A. 2019 Priorities: Should these be our 2020 Priorities? Are they in the right order? – Ken a. Membership Development and Membership Services b. Community Relations and Partnerships c. Management and Operations d. Marketing and Tourism e. Advocacy f. Other Potential Areas?

Suzie: Advocacy is really for the board. Phil: Agreed. First 4 is for staff, remaining are for Board. Ken: Are these still our priorities? Suzie: Yes, as well as Rocket & Hysterical Markers which fall under Tourism. Ken: Suggests moving Community Relations & Partnerships to board. Phil: Raising money for community organizations. When Paul said we need to go to Family Works, that would fall under Community Relations and was not a staff thing, nor did it hit the budget. Ken: Move these down and say these are staff priorities. Reorder this way:


a. Membership Development and Membership Services b. Management and Operations c. Marketing and Tourism d. Community Relations and Partnerships e. Advocacy

B. 2020 Opportunities: Identify Key Tasks, Initiatives and Priorities

a. Membership Development and Membership Services i. Staff to review Membership Plan and look for updates ii. Upgrade Chamber Dashboard & FileMaker

iii. Figure out a consistent way to communicate membership leads to board and vice-versa.

1. Ask Eugene Wasserman who we could highlight in the Blast! 2. Highlight Brown Bear Car Wash! 3. Ask Board for who to highlight!

iv. Starting membership drive in August. v. Database for Blast & database—something Whitney is working on. Great

intern project. vi. Analyze the budget for membership programs, expenses and revenue

opportunities. b. Membership Tools that we need?

i. Membership matrix is so hard to read. ii. More elevated leave-behind for WG season.

iii. Membership Stickers? New Membership packet? Walking in the door. New member love? Give renewing members some love? Capacity to make new members sweeter, more meaningful?

iv. Member since? Member anniversaries. Showing appreciation. v. Renewing and new members get SM & Blast love. vi. Board “telethon” data provided will be revamped. Phil & Brandi to help.

vii. Delinquent report—getting rid of those folks. viii. Time Mgt pie charts: looking at goals and time mgt and look at those

monthly to maintain revenue side. Brandi to meet with us and look at how we are managing our time. Pete gave us a long leash. How do we want to be supported?

ix. Meetings: ability to see member info on our phones x. Bring non-member attendee list to board meeting for board member to

follow up. c. Marketing Tools:

i. Phil: marketing: Bold Hat & Chamber marketing—broad-stroke marketing plan

ii. Ken: smaller programs. Should we brainstorm that? 1. Suzie: Work with City for a Small Biz Chamber. Help with events, etc.

Send out to other areas of town who are bailing on this. They have lost this. Why?

a. Includes shoplifting workshop, safety for employees, etc.


2. Seattle Pacific University: Providing some business educational opportunities. HomeStreet offers things like that. Would there be interest.

3. Coordinate with Nate and see if they’ve had some success with these programs. Then explore a poll in Blast.

d. Management and Operations: i. Chamber Dashboard upgrade needs to be updated.

1. Invoices are not friendly. No personalization. Can’t choose different membership levels.

ii. Culture Foundry expense would go up from $3k to $5k. There’s no way around it. Not maintaining is a bigger cost.

iii. Goal on Whitney’s side: update the website news link. Maintaining the calendar.

iv. Can we drive folks to our SITE first for our events, instead of Constant Contact, etc.

v. Uptick in folks adding their own events! vi. Implement technology budget

vii. Add timing of board elections to Asana for better reminders. viii. How to get residents to be Fremont Fans? “Friend of Fremont”. Re-brand

this “membership” category. 1. Stars with donor names to go on the Rocket 2. Have access to meetings at $25 rate 3. Reach out to the Fremont Neighborhood Council 4. Social Good meeting is very powerful. 5. Riveter—be a friend of the Riveter and have access to their

meetings. 6. Make the ask! B2C communication. 7. Turn Friends into a special list for volunteering

ix. Volunteer links to Bold Hat volunteer board. x. Schedule Liquor board for a board meeting: March-May xi. Intern program--Ken

e. Marketing and Tourism i. Reciprocal marketing from other orgs putting on events. ii. Rocket idea with Phil & fun colors. Stars for fundraisers.

iii. Hysterical Markers—Michael Thomas? 1. 4Culture grant? 2. Small & Simple grant? 3. Matching Fund. 4. Could we do something quick & easy? We came up with a scope last

year. Clean up the graffiti. Recover. Plastic dividers & covers. 3 Tiers of opportunities from minimal to Cadillac version. Get scope/budget by June

5. Mentioned to Etienne at Theo. Put on there and get $$. a. Shared patio with Cascade Bicyles

iv. Meeting with Schilling Cider/Sarah to discuss Passport Program.


v. Finalizing our new mission statement theme. Discuss over email and finalize by February board meeting.

1. Whitney to collect ideas. vi. 30th Anniversary of Farmers Market—discuss with Ryan ways to help out

with marketing, etc. vii. 30th Anniversary of the Troll. Trolloween, Oct 31st. viii. Marketing Plan—create a timeline. Work with Bold Hat to incorporate Bold

Hat Creative Culture branding that was approved. And make sure that working together on events.

ix. Build out Calendar of Awesomeness x. Ken will work with Whitney on larger marketing plan. xi. Phil: A lot of the action items from 2015, are happening now. Great work!

f. Advocacy & Gov’t Relations i. Name badges for board members ii. Let’s do another walk-about with the Mayor’s Office- ask Kyla Blair if we can

do it again and can we get that scheduled. Get it scheduled before they start doing their budgets.

iii. We need reports back from Kurt—from the advisory council. Need regular updates on this (monthly)

iv. Board members be more engaged v. Board members want name tags, specifically Phil vi. Be fleet of foot. Stay on top of things! Suzie is on parking committee and

utility committee and it paid well. Kurt going to N Precinct. Suzie going to metropolitan chamber, but it’s less and less useful. Still, it keeps her informed. Eugene Wasserman is doing a great job. His focus on Ballard Bridge right now. That is the Sound Transit dilemma. All happening at the same time with railroad bridge. Large piece of advocacy the city is not asking for. Freight advisory. Maintenance of the Ballard Locks. Biggest problem for board is keeping eyes and ears open on issues and figuring out where we can insert ourselves.

vii. Sidewalk repairs needed, but SDOT is not coming to us on that. viii. Eric Sano might get pulled for UW head of police there. So we will get

somebody new. Those sorts of things are advocacy things. ix. Special Events Committee: Phil reporting back to changes the Mayor wants

in 2021. When are the fees going up? x. Advocate for the N Precinct picnic in June. We should have a presence. xi. Please send Caroline updates on where community/government events are

happening and when and who is going. xii. Still want to move Metro bus stop south. xiii. Friends of Troll’s Knoll & art: Murals? SPU anti-grafitti folks might know how

to organize this. Also, pair with FAC. xiv.

g. Community Relations and Partnerships i. FAC wants to come to the Feb board meeting. Schedule them so there are

only 2-3 speakers at the meeting. If they don’t reach out, kick them to the


next meeting. How do we help them maintain things? We don’t know who they are. They are doing a campaign for mini-trolls. What does this support?

1. Or shouldn’t we invite them and plan for it? Build bridges? Agreed. 2. Know our boundaries in advance: marketing, etc. 3. Make sure their LEADERSHIP shows up.

ii. Have Fremont Neighborhood Council show up and find out what they are up to and how we can work together.

iii. EarthDay in April thing: how can we do this? Ken does not have the capacity. Pick a date and have a gathering place.

1. Ask new Clean Seattle guy and ask for our garbage plans. Board Action

A. Board meeting schedule: Some have a preference for 8:30, some for 8:00. 5 folks voted to keep it as is: 8:30am.

B. Location: Could Brandi host it here at Adobe? Plan on 18-20 people, with full board and guests.

a. PIM Bicycles offered to host it, too. C. MOTION: Suzie nominates Brandi for President, Paul for VP, Treasurer for Phil, and Amina

for Sec’y. Ken seconded. All in favor and approved. Congratulations to all!

Adjourned: Motion to adjourn by Suzie, seconded by Brandi. All in favor, no opposed. PASSED. So moved at 4:42 pm. Minutes submitted by Caroline Sherman

draft 2020 board retreat minutes

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